Chapter 4

She wiped her eyes, reproach entering her voice.

“You can’t disown your own mother over a little property from years ago.”

I pulled my sleeve from Mom’s hand and picked up the cost statement.

“I’ll pay the share the law requires.”

“But when Qingwei accepted the assets, he promised to bear the principal medical and care expenses.”

He swept the agreement off the table.

Papers scattered across the floor.

At last, he stopped pretending to be a dutiful son.

“That was only to make Mom happy. Who takes that thing seriously?”

His voice carried into the corridor.

A hospital social worker entered and asked what was happening.

After examining the agreement and the lawyer’s witness documents, she placed them before him.

“This isn’t merely a family promise.”

“You accepted most of the property your mother gave away and explicitly agreed to the corresponding expenses. You can’t simply declare it doesn’t count.”

He was still trying to argue when the rehabilitation bill arrived.

Treatment, nursing, and supplies came to almost twenty thousand yuan a month.

He glanced at it and put it down.

“She won’t stand again anyway. What’s the point of spending so much?”

Mom heard every word.

Tears slipped from the corners of her eyes into her hair.

She kept watching him, as though waiting for him to take it back.

Instead, he searched his phone for the cheapest care homes.

A place outside the city charged two thousand a month for a bed and three meals. He immediately decided to send her there.

I paid my share, calculated by the lawyer, and found a licensed facility that could continue her rehabilitation.

Seeing its fees, he backed out again.

“If she wants somewhere that expensive, she can pay herself.”

The lawyer reminded him that his promise and the conditions attached to the gift required him to bear most of the cost.

He shoved his phone into his pocket.

“I have no money. Do whatever you want.”

He left without looking back at her once.

That afternoon, a care aide called me privately. Mom wanted to see me.

When I returned, she was staring at the door.

At the sight of me, she immediately reached out.

She had practiced speaking all afternoon. Air still escaped from the corner of her mouth.

“Take… me home.”

After a long rest, she added:

“Pension… yours.”

In my previous life, those words would have softened me.

Now, I found them absurd.

She gave him assets worth millions. When she wanted my care, a monthly pension of a few thousand was supposed to be a favor.

I didn’t pull my hand away.

“Will you tell our relatives that you gave Qingwei all the houses, savings, and shop, and he refuses to support you?”

Her hand stiffened.

She looked at me but didn’t nod.

Only the heart monitor sounded.

After a long time, she forced out:

“You care.”

“Tell… others… Qingwei pays.”

I thought I had misheard.

She drew a few breaths and tightened her grip.

“Promotion… can’t have… unfilial reputation.”

“Don’t tell Chen Zheng… don’t let children… hate me.”

Those broken words laid bare the final truth of my previous life.

She had always known who cared for her.

She knew he had never spent a day being dutiful.

Yet she would rather slander me than let him lose that reputation.

My marriage, child, and dignity were all things she could sacrifice for him.

I stopped the recording in my pocket.

“You should go to the care home.”

Mom froze.

Then she clutched my hand and forced out curses.

I loosened her fingers one by one and left.

At eleven that night, our doorbell rang.

I opened it to find Mom in a wheelchair.

She wore only a thin layer of clothing.

By her feet sat a plastic bag with two adult diapers and two boxes of medicine.

The lift doors were closing.

My brother stood inside, still pressing the close button.

Meeting my eyes, he quickly turned away.

The lift descended.

Mom’s lips were purple with cold, but she stared at me.

Still waiting for me to soften.

I didn’t leave her outside.

First I called an ambulance, then the police. I saved the door-camera footage and asked building management to witness what had happened.

The next morning, a video lasting little more than ten seconds climbed the local trending list.

In it, I blocked the doorway and wouldn’t let my paralyzed mother in.

My brother livestreamed through the night.

Before the camera, his eyes were bloodshot. He kept wiping tears away.